Horizon: Journey to the East
by kirsant
Summary: Months after the fall of HADES, Aloy recieves a cryptic transmission from Sylens, spurring her on a journey away from the lands and people she knew. Along the way, she discovers answers to old secrets and confronts an enemy that will stop at nothing to see life on Earth wiped out.
1. Chapter 1

**Was just blown away by the game. Great writing, art, world...everything. Loved Aloy's growth. But who am I telling this to? If you're here, you probably know all this already!**

 **This story begins after the main quest line, with Aloy finding Elisabet's body.**

* * *

Elisabet Sobek's body lay facing the rising sun. Aloy found it fitting. Elisabet deserved the dawn. No one would have seen it without her. Only the endless horde of Faro robots would have greeted the cold light, as they slumbered upon a world stripped bare.

Elisabet sacrificed herself to deny that future, and in her death, she rested well, sharing the sunrise and the triumph of her victory with every living being. Once, Aloy had wished for Elisabet to be alive, to hold a conversation with the woman whose genetic core was a copy of her own, but she couldn't imagine a better end. Elisabet's final wish had been to go home, and she had made it there. This whole world ‒ this was her home.

The flowers around Elisabet's body grew in a triangle. Their shadows were long, lilac-colored petals covered in morning dew. A scent of lavender hung in the air, carried by faint brushes of wind.

Aloy came here in the mornings; it had turned into a sort of ritual for her. She would rise an hour before dawn and trek around the derelict Sobek farmstead, her mind lost among images of the past. Elisabet's journals allowed her to tie certain events to places, like the approximate location of the pine tree that she had burned down (long gone by now, of course) or the boulder where she'd scraped her knee to the bone when she was nine.

Inevitably, ten minutes before the first rays of sunlight breached the distant horizon, Aloy's feet would turn towards the flowerbed where Elisabet lay. She'd wander close and sit nearby, listening to the songs of the morning. When the light would break over the mountains, she'd close her eyes, allowing the sun's warmth to caress her skin, gentle, like a lover's touch.

When she rose, the glowing orb of the sun was fully above the snow-capped peaks. They shined, brilliant as diamonds. Aloy would squint at them, until spots of light danced in her eyes and she'd lower her gaze to give Elisabet one last look, before setting off for the day.

 **. . . .**

Aloy came to the Sobek farm two weeks ago. Before that, a month of traveling had caused her to head east, away from the Sacred lands of the Nora tribe and down from the mountains, onto foothills that gave way to a flat plateau, which stretched off into the distance, as far as the eye could see. Aloy didn't miss the Nora. Once, she had looked up to them, resentful and bitter, yes, but still eager to prove her abilities to the braves and the wise-women, to show that she was just as good as them, that she deserved to be accepted. The Nora had seemed so knowledgeable before, pinnacles of the world.

Now, she saw the Nora for what they really were: a tiny ignorant tribe, locked in their lands and their minds by chains of rigid superstition. Living among them had turned impossible after overriding Hades. Few tribespeople would look her in the eye. Most bowed, singing hymns of praise at the feet of the one they had once cast out as a child. The one they had refused to talk or look at. It sickened her. They called her the Anointed now. The Chosen of a God.

Well, they didn't get that right! She wasn't theirs to anoint! She didn't belong to the Nora...or to anyone else, for that matter!

So, she left. Aloy slipped away in the night, going west first, towards Meridian. Erend had been happy to greet her there. The sun king, too, but then he had repeated his proposition, prompting waves of anger to tear through her chest.

To be by his side, Avad had asked, sitting on his throne of gold. Those were his words, but she saw his eyes, and they had demanded more.

There were women who'd have jumped at the offer of sharing the sun king's bed, of wearing the finest Karja silks and having hosts of subjects catering to every whim. Aloy desired none of that, and Avad knew that. He just didn't care. He wanted his Ersa back. But Ersa was dead, and Aloy was more than a suitable replacement. A substitute that had the potential to draw in more people under the sun king's rule in way Erend's sister never could have.

Avad realized his mistake too late ‒ after Aloy had stormed off. To his credit, he didn't send guards to bring her back. Not that it would have helped. She'd have run from Meridian in a heartbeat. Aloy hadn't seen or heard from Avad since.

Still, she spent a whole week in the city. Erend showed her the sights, many of which had been recently rebuilt. Despite the many signs of battle, the Karja capitol beat with life. Thousands of men and women, dressed in the garb of a dozen different tribes (from Nora to Banuk to Shadow Carja to outlanders from the south) strolled its stone-paved streets. Vendors cried their wares. Children ran unsupervised, snatching fruit from shop carts. The clang of metal echoed from Osseram workshops; their furnaces burned bright into the long hours of the night.

It was easy to relax here now. No killers hunted her; no monster-machines lurked in the dark. Instead, the atmosphere was festive. The nights could be spent talking and dancing, drinking. Erend introduced her to the infamous Osseram firewater, which burned the insides going in, only to settle with a joyous warmth, making the world simpler but somehow brighter. Maybe it's because people tend to overthink matters sometimes, Aloy thought.

The whole week, Erend had been by her side. Aloy didn't know where this could have led, if she had remained. Many women her age had already found a partner; among the tribes, girls were usually wed after their sixteenth spring, and Erend wasn't a bad candidate. But a week of carefree carousing had left her longing. There was a pull, tugging her away from the urban sprawl and into the vastness of the wilds. The city began to weigh on her shoulders, the noises grate on her ears. It was a sharp contrast to the Embrace, where the loudest sound was the roar of water cascading from steep mountain cliffs. Otherwise, her birthplace had been quiet, serene. It had been a good life there, with Rost.

But Rost was gone.

Aloy knew she had to visit his grave again. After that ‒ who knew? There were lands to explore, cauldrons to visit. GAIA could be repaired, Sylens had theorised. Maybe there was even a version of Apollo somewhere, hidden and ready to impart its secrets to those who asked. It was possible. The world was vast, after all. Aloy had seen it: a globe, projected by the machines of the Old Ones in the ruins of what was once called the USRC. The lands of the all the tribes she knew ‒ from the upper edge of Banuk territories in the north to the southernmost tip of the Nora Embrace ‒ was but a blip on that sphere. Elisabet's people had settled it all ‒ only to lose it because of the greed of one man.

When Aloy left Meridian, Erend had clapped his hand on her shoulder, wishing a well journey. "You need any help, you just send word," he'd said gruffly. "I'll come. You hear that, Aloy? Wherever you are, whatever you need, I'll be there. I mean it." He had blinked several times, quickly, and Aloy suddenly had to turn away, because her own vision had blurred.

Walking out of Meridian's gates, Aloy had looked back once, and the image of Erend waving goodbye was still burned into her mind, hot as coals under the midday Karja sun.

By the time she had returned to the Nora lands, to that little cottage where she and Rost had shared all the years of her childhood, Aloy knew her next destination. She wanted to find the woman who made her world possible. Elisabet's last words had been about going home. Aloy's focus had accessed maps of the Old Ones in the USRC. The Sobek farmstead was right there, among other locations that had held no meaning ‒ not anymore. After superimposing the old maps on new terrain, Aloy had a clear route to Elisabet's beginnings.

But before leaving for the Sobek farmstead, she spent several days in Rost's cottage. The gravesite was obviously tended to, but the home had begun to fall into disrepair. Nothing major, just little things; telltale signs that no one lived here anymore. She'd fixed what she could, delaying the inevitable parting. She didn't want to say goodbye. She didn't want to face Rost ‒ or what was left of him, at least.

With bile under her tongue, Aloy still recalled the angry words she had yelled in Rost's face, after he had stunned her with his announcement of departure. Rost wanted to leave, so that she wouldn't have to break any laws, any of those stupid, worthless Nora commandments that had neither rhyme nor reason behind them. Aloy hadn't cared for his motivations then; all she saw was another individual ‒ one who had been _family_ ‒ abandoning her to the unknown.

It had hurt, and she had promptly lashed out in return. She knew she hurt him back ‒ she'd seen it in his eyes, clear as thunder on a cloudless day. His wounded feelings had brought her an ugly satisfaction then. Now, that memory only carried the acute sting of grief.

When she kneeled in front of his gravesite, her mouth had locked. She couldn't say anything; only harsh sobs escaped from her throat. Trails of tears, heavy with salt, had stung her cheeks. Then, when the pain became bearable once more, she had begun to speak. She talked until the sun set and an aching moon rose to the heavens above, bathing the world in silver light. Aloy told Rost about her travels, about leaving the Nora lands to find the secrets of the Old Ones; about the people she met along the way and the Shadow Carja she fought, bringing down their false god along with them.

She spoke quietly, finding peace in her own tale. Only once did her voice rise: when she recounted the duel with Helis on the walls of the Sun Palace. Hate, thick as machine oil, bubbled through her words. When Helis had fallen, impaled on her spear and hot blood gushing through his wounds, she had taunted him as a fool and a slave. Her words had given her a twisted pleasure, and even now, months after the event, she felt the satisfaction of killing him stirring in her gut.

She'd kicked Helis down from the battlements, then, after promising to wipe his name from history. He'd still been alive. His body hadn't been found, probably picked clean by vultures after the battle.

That too, Aloy found fitting.

With dawn, her tale came to end. She looked around at the place of her youth, and then left quietly, softly, as if afraid to disturb the one who slumbered here. Her bag had already been packed. She carried only the bare necessities: provisions, hunting materials, healing salves. With her bow, bag and spear, Aloy had set off down from Rost's cottage, found a herd of striders grazing nearby, and overridden one to carry her away.

She climbed on its back and set off, following the trail in her focus that would lead her straight to the Sobek farm. She never once looked back.

When she found Elisabet, something had clicked in her chest. She felt...whole suddenly, like the world had turned to offer more light upon her languished soul. The sorrow and guilt, the pleasure at her enemies' deaths...it all went away. It was quiet here. Game was good, machines few. Herds of tramplers ambled by in the distance, but never approached. A stormbird passed over one day, heading east, but Aloy had hidden, unwilling to bring it down. They machines were fixing the earth, she knew; healing the wounds made by the Old Ones.

It was nearly her third week here, and although she had no intention of leaving, she had once again begun to feel a longing. A drive to go somewhere, but...where? For the past many months, her objective had been clear: avenge Rost's death and discover the secret of her past. But now, with Hades gone and the Eclipse defeated, her future seemed muddy.

Aloy rose, brushing the thoughts away. The sun was above the mountains already, glinted off the snow and Elisabet's suit. Another day had come. Aloy turned to the northern edge of the farm. There, the land dipped and a deep brook, frigid from mountain snows, ran swiftly downhill. Aloy bathed in it twice a day, once after her morning commune with Elisabet and once before sunfall.

She headed there now, carefully untangling her braids to let the hair whip free about her shoulders. It had grown of late; usually, she cut it shorter to make running and hunting easier. Killing, too. There hadn't been a need for that.

She was down to her undergarments when her focus buzzed to life. Instinctevely, she dove down into the grass and crouched, quickly scanning her surroundings for any signs of danger.

"...Aloy?"

There was static in the transmission, but she knew that voice.

"Sylens," she growled, straightening up. "What do you want?" She didn't trust Sylens. The man had an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, and he would do almost anything to fulfill his need. Morality didn't matter to him. Well...almost didn't matter, but his greed was so great that he could overlook things and take risks he shouldn't. Just as another man had. Ted Faro, who single-handedly caused the collapse of an entire planet.

"I'm afraid I have some bad news."

Aloy rolled her eyes. "As opposed to all the other kind of news you've brought?" she bit back, sarcastically. "What did you do this time, Sylens?"

"Now's not the time for verbal sparring, Aloy," she heard. The interference was getting worse. "This is urgent. I'm sending you...series of coordinates. Meet me...on the new moon. I'll explain more when I see you."

"How about you explain more _now?_ " Aloy demanded. "Sylens?"

The static grew, cresting into a sharp, metallic squeal. Aloy winced, but her focus had already adjusted the noise level to a lower volume.

"Sylens?" she tried again. "Hello? Sylens?! Damn you!"

Sylens was gone. The only remainder of their short conversation was a blinking yellow light in the corner of the focus-sight. A set of numbers. Per her request, the focus quickly enlarged them, transplanting the coordinates onto a map of the surrounding area. Aloy whistled when she saw the name of the place Sylens wanted her to go to.

Wichita, Kansas, where the last battalions of USRC troops had made a desperate last stand to win out days ‒ even hours ‒ for project Horizon: Zero Dawn. Five Horus-class titans had eventually broken through, overrunning the defenses. The place was a graveyard, no doubt, teeming with machines and maybe...other things.

"Oh, what have you done, Sylens?" Aloy murmured to herself, as her body was already in motion. Her hair was twisted back into braids, her outer garments fitted on. She dashed towards the shelter she had made; there, her traveling pack was always ready. Her bow was oiled; spear sharp. Arrows were ready, and her provisions ‒ mostly smoked fish, dried greens, and a waterskin ‒ packed away. In fifteen minutes, only her tracks and the shelter were proof that she'd ever been here. Her shield-weaver armor was fitted, softly vibrating against her other layers.

Aloy's heart thumped through her chest. This is what she had been waiting for: a mission, a goal. Suddenly, her stay here made perfect sense: she had been resting, preparing for the fights ahead, because of course the story of Horizon wasn't over. It had just begun.

Aloy lifted her pack, settling it next to the bow, spear and arrow quiver on her back. She trotted out of her shelter, squinting as the sun met her eyes. Elisabet...she needed to say goodbye.

Elisabet Sobek hadn't moved. She lay peaceful, almost as if she were just asleep. If she was, then this world was her dream. Aloy reached out to brush her fingers against the visor glass. "Thank you," she whispered, and turned to go.

Her foot snagged. She stumbled against Elisabet's suit, hearing the metal protest, a sharp, unpleasant sound. The body moved, twisting to the side, as the momentum brought one of Elisabet's arms to the ground. Her fist smacked into the dirt, and something fell out.

Aloy detected the energy signature immediately. It was faint ‒ the metal of Elisabet's suit had been enough to conceal it ‒ but now obvious. Hesitantly, she leaned down to inspect the little bit of metal.

 _Data Key,_ her focus provided. _Inaccessible. Encryption level Alpha Prime._

"Unencrypt." Aloy tried, but her focus just blared out the impossibility of such an action. Carefully, Aloy picked the object up. "What is this, Elisabet?" she murmured. "What were holding at the very end?"

She twisted it, watching the sun glint off the edges. On the other side, an inscription caught her eye. She carefully brushed away the dirt and grime to reveal just two words.

 _Project Nadezhda_

Project was obvious, but _Nadezhda_? What did that mean? And if this was a data _key,_ then what door did it open? The focus stayed silent, seemingly just as baffled as its owner.

Aloy sighed, carefully tucking the data key away into her armor. Sylens had requested to meet at the new moon, and she needed to travel quickly to meet his deadline. She whistled; her overridden strider mount heard and cantered up. She jumped on its back and nudged the sides with her heels.

Her journey was, too, was at its start.


	2. A New Friend

The terrain sloped down, gradually; foothills giving way to vast plains covered in prairie grasses. The mountains were at her back. Several times, Aloy glanced back at them, watching the peaks grow smaller in the distance. She'd never been this far before; in fact, she was sure none of the Nora had.

As the land changed, so did the animals upon it. Ravagers and sawtooths disappeared; herds of striders, grazers, tramplers and broadheads became more common. There were also new machines, ones Aloy had never seen before: large bison-like creatures, small gophers and prairie dogs, swarms of tiny robotic birds that chittered endlessly from within the tall grass. Very quickly, Aloy detected a strangeness in their behavior. Here, far away from human lands, the machines didn't exhibit signs of aggression. She tested her theory on a charger: when she approached it, cautious and ready to dodge any attack, it merely raised its head, snorted, and then returned to munching grass.

Aloy was stunned. The derangement hadn't touched these machines. They were docile, just like in the stories. But if the derangement had been caused by GAIA's subfunctions becoming independent, shouldn't these creatures be just as hostile?

What if there was more to the story then? What if more dangerous machines appeared only in response to human behavior ‒ hunting? Was HEPHAESTUS ‒ the program in charge of creation ‒ merely trying to safeguard its children?

Such thoughts occupied Aloy as she rode east, often changing mounts to allow the old ones rest. Apart from the grass, the land was mostly barren. Sometimes, she'd come across piles of rubble ‒ remains of ancient structures. In places, the land was cut with deep with wounds that hadn't yet healed. In these locations, debris and rusted out metal carcasses littered the ground. After the Wichita defensive line had collapsed, the surviving remains of USRC troops had retreated west, fighting for time. Their sacrifice hadn't saved them ‒ nothing could ‒ but it allowed Horizon to live. Aloy always analyzed these old battlegrounds with her focus, discovering active datapoints. Most were corrupted ‒ or simply blank noise ‒ but sometimes she'd find ones with logs or voice diaries. One had stood out in particular. She located it beneath an empty atmosphere suit, so riddled with holes that it left nothing to the imagination as to what happened to its owner.

 _Cpt. Simmons_

 _7'th MRB Auxiliary_

 _Jan. 16, 2066_

 _Simmons (exhausted voice):_ Transport broke down. Guess it's a good place as any. At least the Mark II's got away. We saved twelve, right before the swarm broke through our flanks. They'll buy Sobek's people some time, although few of us believe Horizon is real anymore. Horizon...that word...it's like a dream, and how can dreams come true on a planet where the sky's turned dark with machines? Dear God, I can see them from here. Hey! Lepkin! How's Kraus? Didn't make it? Don't worry, we'll join him soon enough…"

There were other datapoints, too; some pertaining to the military's last days, others just relics of the past. Some didn't make any sense whatsoever. For example, this one:

 _Pwned by n00bz? Avatar Advancement Services is at your disposal! Cheatz and hackz for any MMSO/HRPG! Get boosted today!_

Or the next:

 _LLS 4 U! CHP 'n EZY! Only for a limited time!_

The Old One's language must have been complicated, Aloy thought, if they had to resort to constant abbreviations and acronyms.

Despite pausing for datapoints, Aloy's progress across the plains was swift. Only once was she stopped when the path forward became obstructed by a convoy of machines. Aloy saw the procession as a cloud of dust on the horizon, first. She double-checked her weapons before nudging the strider into a cautious trot. At three thousand paces, she dismounted and proceeded on foot, using the tall grass as cover. She could see the outline of machines in the distance, the ground thundering beneath many feet. She neared them carefully, breath still and eyes wide with wonder.

Aloy had never seen so many machines gathered in one place, or moving so purposefully. It took hours for them to pass. By the end of the day, Aloy had counted thirty Behemoths and over a hundred Shell-Walkers, escorted by dozens of watchers and longlegs at the sides. A total of six thunderjaws oversaw the entire operation, and, by the time the sun went down, it was still going by. What was hidden in those crates, Aloy wondered? Where were the machines headed...and why?

But following them was out of the question, so Aloy eventually retreated. There, at a safe distance, she spread out her bedroll among the grass and lay to watch the night sky. Dashes of light danced across the cosmos, falling stars falling to sleep. The moon, a thin and pale bow, watched their descent from its lofty perch. The Old Ones had once sought safe harbor in the heavens, Aloy knew, but it was not meant to be. Their ship, the Odyssey, had been lost, leaving only Elisabet's project as Earth's hope for revival.

Aloy wondered what Elisabet's last thoughts had been. Had she thought of her childhood, of days on the farm? Or did she pray that GAIA would fulfill her destiny? And what was that strange device in her hand ‒ the one labeled _Project Nadezhda?_ Aloy's hands rose almost instinctively to check whether it was still safe within her armor. The data key felt cold against fingers.

When she fell asleep, Aloy saw Elisabet. She was reaching out with her hands, beckoning Aloy to come closer, as if she had something to tell her. But the more Aloy tried to approach, the harder it was. A bitter blew against her form, sending up flurries of snowflakes that obstructed her vision. Aloy bent her head against the wind, but when she looked up again, Elisabet was gone. Rost stood in her place. His skin was bloodless, like that of a corpse on ice, and his eyes burned with the red glare of a corrupted machine. _There's no hope for you,_ he whispered harshly. _Not anymore._ Rost became Helis, and Helis transformed into Nil, then Olin, as the cavalcade of dead marched through her dreams, chanting of the inevitability of death. The winds grew stronger, a blizzard of ice, until Aloy lost herself in the wail of white.

She woke three hours before dawn, sweaty, unrested, with a parched throat. She eased the latter with two sips from her waterskin, being careful to conserve what she had. Water was scarce on the plains, and rain might not come for weeks.

Aloy rose carefully, glancing around. The machine convoy had passed, although she could still hear its metallic groan in the distance, as it continued to its mysterious destination.

The air was crisp. She stretched before gathering her things and proceeding on foot, following the route to Wichita. Her strider had left in the night, and it was only four hours later that she caught another one.

He turned out to be a good companion and didn't utter a single noise in all their time together.

 **. . . .**

She saw the glinthawks from afar. There were maybe half a dozen, circling above a spot where the land curved upwards into a small hill. A pile of rubble rested at the summit, beams of weathered metal sticking out of the ground like spearheads. From time to time, the glinthawks would dive down between them and then hastily retreat, perching upon the ends with indignant squawking.

Whatever lay hidden among those ruins, the scavengers couldn't get it. Not yet.

Aloy decided to inspect the area. Despite the delay the machine convoy had caused her, she was still ahead of schedule. The new moon was days away.

She eased her bow and checked that the spear slid soundlessly into her hands. The arrows in her quiver were separated into three groups: regular, elemental, and tearblaster. She prepared the fire ones; the mixture covering their heads would combust upon impact, dousing the victim in flame. Glinthawks were particularly vulnerable.

Crouching, she made her way to the bottom of the hill and began to ascend. Although the slope was almost negligible, the debris, concrete and twisted pieces of metal made pathing tricky. Several times, Aloy had to pull herself over obstacles, only to quickly jump back into the shadows.

The glinthawks, too preoccupied with their prey, paid her no heed. Their cries covered whatever noises she made and now that Aloy was closer, she could hear another sound: a low growling that rose in volume every time the glinthawks dived down. Aloy couldn't see the source of the noise, though: it was still concealed behind the rubble.

After several minutes of climbing, Aloy reached the base of one of the metal pillars. Looking straight up, she could see one of the glinthawks sitting at the top, its wings spread out like a cormorant drying in the sun. There was another one next to it; four more were in the air. Before drawing her bow, Aloy quickly scanned her surroundings, mapping out routes of attack and escape.

 _Always know your environment, Aloy,_ Rost's voice flashed into her mind. _Use it to your advantage. Hunting requires perfection._

Satisfied with her position, Aloy rose, silently shifting into an archer's stance. Her bow, arrow nocked, rose to point at the glinthawk above her.

There was always a certain...serenity to these moments, when the target was still blissfully unaware of its fate. In those one or two heartbeats, Aloy could observe a slice of someone's life, watch their facial expression, whether smiling or scowling, but unquestionably, for that moment, still alive.

Aloy saw the sun's ray gleaming off the glinthawk's metal wings, and a quietness settled around. She counted her breaths, taking one, two, and...

With the grace of an experienced hunter, she drew back the bowstring in one fluid motion and let her arrow fly. It whistled through the air, another one behind it on a slightly different trajectory. Contact. A flower of fire blossomed on the nearest glinthawk's chest, and it shrieked, a high-pitched and wounded sound. The sharp, sudden heat was burning through fragile connections, hampering processing signals. It floundered, crashing to the ground. Aloy was on it in an instant, her spear piercing the metal frame to penetrate the glinthawk's robotic heart.

It squealed, once, and then fell silent, blue light slowly fading from its eyes. Aloy pulled her spear back and dashed over to the second glinthawk, which had fallen next to its sister. Again her spear moved in a blinding motion, bringing down the number of glinthawks to four.

The other ones had spied her, however, and she had to roll to the side to avoid a burst of frost. Aloy's shield-weaver armor hummed, as if anticipating the threat, as more frost bombs exploded all around her, scouring the surrounding rocks and metal with white. Aloy jumped away, weaving between the ancient rubble until she spied another shot.

One of the glinthawks was swooping down, aiming for a kill. Aloy sidestepped at the last moment, firing off an arrow at the creature's back. She felt the flame's heat flare as the glinthawk veered off course and crashed into a pillar. The ancient support beam teetered and then came crashing down, burying the creature beneath it and forcing Aloy to leap back right into the center of a frost explosion.

Aloy's armor negated the more harmful effects, but it couldn't guard from the heavy numbness that rapidly began spreading through her limbs. Heart pounding, Aloy jumped again, grabbing the edge of a ledge and lifting herself away from the cold. A sharp metallic sound tore through the air as the claws of another glinthawk raked over the stone where her body had just been. Gasping, Aloy rolled away deeper into the labyrinth of debris, trying to catch her breath. Her bow lay on the ground, where she'd been forced to drop it to avoid the last attack. Fortunately, the machines had lost sight of her, flying in confused circles above the ruins. Aloy tiptoed carefully, circling around and using the remaining structures as cover. A quick dash, and the bow was once again in her hands. Two more arrows flew, one going high, the other hitting its target. The wounded machine fell from the sky, and Aloy pounced, delivering a fatal blow to the fourth scavenger.

Only two machines remained. They flew up higher, hovering just out of the bow's reach. Aloy straightened, staring them down, even though she was the one below. She sensed a puzzling hesitation in these creatures, an unwillingness to prolong the battle that had already taken more than half their number. The silence stretched ‒ a brief and laden second ‒ and then the machines tore upwards, flying away. Aloy watched them go with confusion. This behavior was abnormal. Glinthawks didn't retreat; they chased down their prey until either it had fallen...or they. Then again, she wouldn't complain.

Now, after the heat of battle, everything seemed still. Slowly melting frost covered the land, giving it a nippy chill. In the silence, Aloy heard the sounds that had piqued her curiosity in the first place: that low growling which was now only several dozen paces away, concealed behind the broken walls of the Old One's structure. She hefted her spear and cautiously advanced, crawling over piles of debris until she reached three metal beams leaning precariously over a hollow in the ground. There, pinned down by a collapsed metal frame and lodged between rocks lay a sawtooth. Its head snapped up when Aloy appeared, cold blue eyes meeting soft green. Aloy froze.

This machine's gaze was different than any others. There was a depth in these eyes, traces of an intellect capable of more than following simple directives. Aloy felt something brush against her mind...an almost imperceptible touch. Then the sawtooth shook its head, breaking the abrupt connection. It growled, baring its metal fangs in the direction of the human. Aloy didn't flinch. The sawtooth was trapped: on its side, with half the body weighed down by rusted steel and concrete, it couldn't find the leverage to force itself free.

Aloy's feet scuffled against the ground as she approached. The sawtooth growled louder, snapping its jaws. Up closer, Aloy could see it sported signs of battle. Rough scratches adorned the animal's hide and several sensors were broken straight off, sending up small fountains of electrical sparks from the severed connections. The smell of oil was thick in the air. It was what probably attracted the glinthawks, who had come to pick apart the broken machine, except the sawtooth had fought back. Even in its trapped state, it had managed to bring down one of the scavengers, crushing its head in its jaws. The others must have taken offense, and would have eventually worn down the sawtooth, except Aloy had chased them off.

Normally, a sawtooth was a worthy catch for a hunter. The parts, highly valued, could fetch a decent amount of shards from traders, who would then sell their wares in Meridian or any other large settlement for profit. Of course, it was a dangerous game: even the most experienced tribesman could fall prey to a sawtooth's claws. Many considered the reward not worth the risk, as a wounded hunter couldn't bring in game, thus becoming a liability to his tribe and family.

But even if Aloy did harvest the parts, there was no one to sell them to. The closest human settlement was a full moon's ride away.

For a moment, there was a hint of indecision in her posture. Aloy bit her lip, looking at the sawtooth before her. The creature snarled, warning her to stay away – an impotent threat. Already injured and caught in the wreckage like a fox in a trap, the sawtooth was helpless.

By all rights, Aloy should have put down the wounded creature – a show of mercy, if anything – but her hand froze two finger-lengths away from her spear.

It was the sawtooth's reaction that made her hesitate. The moment she reached for her weapon, it opened its mouth and howled; a harsh, metallic noise that rose in a crescendo, voicing fury, despair, and…fear? Stunned, Aloy jerked her hand away, and the howl subsided.

Aloy had never seen such a... _human_ reaction. While it made sense that a machine's system would have stored the concept of weapons in its memory bank, this was...beyond comprehension. This behavior was abnormal, just like the machine convoy of gargantuan proportions carrying who-knows-what to what-knows-where and the glinthawks flying away. Something was changing in this world, and HEPHAESTUS' creations were one of the most obvious symptoms.

Putting those thoughts aside for the moment, Aloy quickly unburdened herself of her spear, placing it five paces away. Then, with a pounding heart, she approached the sawtooth from its blind spot, where it couldn't reach her with its fangs or claws. It began to thrash, yowling just like a cat, but the metal held it down. Its skin was warm, slick in places with leaking oil.

Aloy's fingers trembled as she ran them over the elegants curves of metal coils, wires, and sensors. It was fascinating. This was not like touching an overridden machine; those were docile, but this...this sawtooth was a product of the wild, a feral thing that was, nevertheless, something more than a simple animal. It was probably terrified, Aloy thought. Scared of death and its own helplessness, just like any living thing.

She started to speak to it. Her voice was low and soothing, a tone used to calm frightened children. She was careful to exhibit no signs of aggression, make no movements that would startle the beast. Her tactic worked. As if reassured by her actions, the sawtooth quieted and lay still. Aloy used this moment to move up its body, examining the injuries more closely. Many were superficial; for example, one of the sensors next to the sawtooth's head was only bent. A quick fix. The real damage was from a long gash along the side, where armor plates had been ripped off, leaving the vulnerable insides exposed.

"The glinthawks didn't do this," Aloy murmured. The sawtooth, almost as if it was responding, huffed disdainfully. It had calmed under Aloy's ministrations, no longer fearful. "Who did you fight, boy?" she asked. "Were you running from them? Is this how you got trapped?"

The sawtooth whined, pawing at the ground. Aloy sighed. Her decision was already made: she couldn't leave him like this. If she stripped the glinthawks of parts, then there was enough for repairs, but freeing him was another issue altogether.

The next two hours were spent in a flurry of work. Aloy dragged together all the bodies of the fallen glinthawks, breaking them apart to find the parts she needed. She mended the sawtooth's broken connections, tying them together with bits of coil; replaced two leaking blaze canisters and a damaged power cell; and refit the armored plates on its shoulder which had been knocked loose. This brought her into close contact with the sawtooth's head, but it didn't harm her. It just looked, holding still as she healed its wounds, its blue eyes glowing brighter with every fix.

There wasn't much Aloy could do with the loss of armor on the side – she wasn't an Osseram welder, not that there was anything to weld with – so, by nightfall, there was only one thing left to do: free the creature. Aloy left that for morning.

She used the last rays of sunlight to nibble on some of the dry fish from her pack, and then, exhausted by the days' battle and hard work, fell asleep leaning against the sawtooth's side.


	3. Chapter 3

Prairie birds heralded the dawn. Aloy listened to their songs as she warmed up breakfast over a small fire made with dry grass and some of the scraggly bushes that grew in abundance nearby. She kept looking up as she did so, squinting at the sky. The air was tense, heavy; by midday, Aloy decided, there would be rain.

"Should be more than enough time to free you," she told her unlikely companion. The sawtooth growled in response. "You don't talk much, do you?" Aloy asked, and then thought out loud: "Maybe it's because you don't have a name. Hmm? What should I call you?"

The sawtooth expressed its displeasure at such a proposition with another growl, and Aloy laughed. "Is that the only sound you can make? Then it's decided: Grawl it is."

Grawl looked unhappy, but it wasn't like he had much say in the issue. He lay quietly as Aloy inspected the metal pinning him down. Some bits she was able to move with just her bare hands, but most of it was too heavy...for her, that is. Now if only she could use the sawtooth's strength… "Stay here," she told Grawl, leaving to scour the ruins. He whined at her retreating form, and she shot him a smile over her shoulder, saying she'd be back soon, which seemed to satisfy the sawtooth, because he snorted and then lowered his head to the ground with a very feline huff.

Aloy, true to her word, returned to the campsite an hour later, hauling several thin planks of metal, approximately thirty arm lengths of wire, and some ancient pulleys that weren't all rusted through.

Grawl stared like she'd lost her mind.

And indeed, the contraption, when she was done with it, looked like something out of an Osseram horror show. Lengths of wire, threaded through a system of pulleys, hung down from a support beam. On one side, they reached Grawl's head; on the other, the ends were fastened to the debris covering the sawtooth's back. The idea was for Grawl to use one end of the wire to pull the other, thus freeing himself.

It was an admittingly terrible recreation of some of the cranes she'd seen at scrap heaps, but, hey, it's not like she had much to work with.

"And it will work," Aloy reassured the sawtooth. "It will," she repeated, this time more to herself, as she carefully lifted the ends of the wires to Grawl's jaws. He leaned forward as much as he could, craning his head to win every possible inch. His teeth were only a finger's length away from Aloy when he clasped his jaws around the wire, but she didn't even flinch. Once she the wires were secure, Aloy jumped up next to the frames and material that were pinning Grawl down. "Ready?" she cried, positioning herself behind the debris so she could push. "Then on three! One! Two..! _Three!_ "

A deep sound rumbled through Grawl's chest, and metal squealed as he started to lean back, pulling the wires and metal with the force of his neck and upper body. The wires sung with tautness, but held, as the metal on top began to give. "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon!" Aloy huffed, straining from exertion, as she assisted Grawl's efforts. "Yes!"

The first sheet of metal collapsed on the ground. "And again!"

They repeated the process three times. The sun had reached its zenith when the second one fell, giving Grawl some room to wriggle underneath, but it still wasn't enough. On the next attempt, however, Aloy suddenly felt the debris start to shift, like the ground during an earthquake, and then part, throwing her off-balance. She stumbled and fell with a surprised cry, hitting the ground at a roll to defuse her momentum. The rocks pricked against her skin, and then she came to a stop with her back against the wall of the hollow.

Aloy looked up. Grawl was right in front of her. He'd broken free of his prison.

He was so close she could hear the whirr of his motors and the crackle of electric current running through his veins. If he attacked...there was nowhere to go. No time to dodge or roll away or even use her spear to parry, because she had left it on the other side of the pit. She was helpless.

Slowly, to a tightening in her throat, Grawl began to advance, closing the gap between them. He was three paces away.

Two.

Then one.

She could raise her hand and reach his snout, trace her fingers over the metal grooves that gave way to those deadly fangs, capable of shredding her in two, but Grawl, instead of attacking, tilted his head down to stare right into her eyes.

And the world became blue.

For a heartbeat, that was all there was, but then it lit up with a rainbow of color. Lines appeared, in hues of gold and white, and there, in the very center, beating red at its core, was a familiar female shape.

Through Grawl's eyes, Aloy saw herself.

And then her focus went in overdrive, a thousand queries hitting it all at once. She sensed it exchanging information, sending it over a web of light to distances she couldn't even fathom. She heard responses, questions, echoes, and, all at once, her world expanded into something unimaginably vast, and she saw it with a thousand eyes and a million sensors. Blaze began to thrum through her heart, and electricity zapped in her veins. She saw the sun as an orb of unfettered energy, and felt the breath of the cosmos glide over her skin.

She greeted hundreds of brothers and sisters, and they answered her, careful yet inquisitive. They were all connected, she understood now. Each machine was separate but together they made one whole, and she was a part of it now. A part of them.

They sang to her, a hymn of ones and zeroes that shouldn't have made any sense, except it did and it was vibrant and _alive._ Their language could articulate things the human tongue could not, show colors and sounds never intended for the fragile mortal senses. They were beautiful, these sounds: a symphony of metal and light. It overwhelmed her…

Her focus was adapting, she could feel it, but it was too much. The colors too bright, the noises too loud, and the questions, those millions of questions, too many. Her mind began to waver, yielding to pain, rising like a tidal wave. It loomed over her, eager to drown her body and drag it down into that blackened abyss, where her soul, sightless, would endlessly drift through a sea of dark. The noises rose to a cacophony then, electric highs and industrial lows, and she couldn't take it anymore, she couldn't, and her mouth opened to scream, but it all suddenly…

Stopped.

In the blink of an eye, the machine world was gone, and she was back in her own, staring into Grawl's sapphire eyes.

The abrupt change left her breathless. Dazed, she watched Grawl lean forward, rubbing his muzzle against her cheek with a feline purr. The contact sparked something, letting her move, but when she raised a hand to touch him, Grawl had already retreated. He surveyed her carefully, as if checking to see if she was alright, and then, satisfied with with the inspection, backed away further, crouched and, in one fluid motion, leapt up.

He soared over her, landing on the ground above, and bounded away, swift as a strider's breath. Aloy watched him go with a strange clenching in her heart. She stayed still even after he disappeared from view and then moved only when the heavens started to rumble.

The rain she had been expecting since morning had finally arrived.


End file.
